United We Stand

I’d like to start this rant by asking everyone to have a moment of silence for both those that were affected by the Boston Marathon bombs as well as for those that were affected by the West, TX factory fire incident.

In less than a week, multiple Americans have died in tragic ways and many more have been hospitalized. The family members of those that will have lifelong physical ailments or amputations will be reminded of the day of the tragedy. They will also have to work really hard to return to a semblance of normality. The families of these people will also be affected by the horrific events.

I think that there is so much evil and violence going on in the US right now, that we have to take a minute to relish in the fact that we’re Americans. We have party, racial, professional, etc divisions in our everyday life, but we are American. We believe in freedom, equality, and success. We like trashy reality TV, we like to be politically correct, and we like to eat fatty food. I believe that as diverse as we are, we have all these common threads that people need to remember.

We need to gauge those feelings of solidarity and from now on walk around with a big smile plastered onto our faces. We need to start saying hi to one another. Mother Theresa once said that world peace starts with a smile. I believe that. We need to start putting our cell phones away during dinner and start being grateful that we live in the best nation in the world. I swear, I went to Juarez, Mexico not to long ago. Juarez is the city where I would be living at if my aunt wouldn’t have been as brave as she was when she became the first in her family to uproot and move to the US. Many parts of the Mexican city are so sad and dirty. The people are nice, but you can feel the over two decade long violence weight people down. And I can’t help being grateful when I realize that I would be there if it weren’t for my family. This is why I’m so proud to be an American. Where else can you get a full ride to a great university and know that as long as you work hard, you’ll be ok?

This brings me back to this week’s Boston attack. We’ve had random attacks for a long time, but somehow it seems like there’s a lot more of them occurring this year. There’s a theory called copycat killings, and basically it’s a phenomenon that explains why so many murders precede a publicized one. So, while this is purely speculation, it is quite possible that the media are playing a role in the perpetuation of the occurrence of these tragic events. That’s a pretty loaded statement though, so I’ll stop at that.

Something that always intrigues me are the people that commit these crimes. I’m talking about the crimes that deal with home terrorism. They are always men, and for the most part white. But then there are other ethnicities that partake in them, as well.

However, I don’t think that I’ve heard about any of these being Hispanic. Which brings me to the anti-immigration argument that politicians and civilians always use: the influx of criminal activity as a result of Hispanic immigration into the US. But if Hispanic peoples are so violent, then why haven’t we heard of a Mexican/Chilean/Columbian person firing an automatic weapon and injuring many? I know I just talked about contemplating the threads that make us American, but I feel like we have to let go of these anti-immigration and Hispanic individual stereotypes in order to have more threads. That and smile. Please remember to smile.